By: Stephen Machuga (ShanghaiSix)
Not able to take out Omnicron yet? Don’t worry. With this handy guide on farming in Loop Hero, you’ll have all the materials you need to build out your camp and beat the archmage at his own game.
The class I used was Rogue. I was a big Warrior player, then switched to Necromancer, but found that the Rogue is a unique blend of the two. Using the golden card “Arsenal” in your deck, you unlock the Rogue’s ability to wear a necklace, which gives your Rogue a magic shield that regenerates to maximum after every fight. Absolutely essential, as the Rogue has no Vampirism outside of a 5% base amount. That’s not enough to survive the long game, period.
Rogues live and die on attack speed, so having a long “River” serpentining around one side of your map with forests is critical...but only to a point. Loop Hero has a stamina gauge it doesn’t really tell you about, but the first time your Rogue tops out at 150-200% attack speed, you’ll see a yellow bar under your health bar filling back up as he stands there getting beat on. That means you’re winded and can’t do much except for counterattack and evade. So that keeps you from only building out attack speed. The other side of that coin is the health/attack speed debuff that comes with the “Oasis” and “Sand Dune” combo. Focus on filling up your starting river squares with Forests, and then when you start leaning into 150-200% attack speed, switch up to using Sand Dune cards near your River.
The goal here is to get as many little creatures on each loop as possible to quickly fill up your trophy bag. Pair that with the Rogue’s level-up ability of “Picky,” where you get higher level items but get a fewer number of them based on the number of trophies you bring back. That means if you’re rolling into camp with 100 trophies, each item quality you get is far higher than the current loop level you’re on. Your goal is to be at least 3-4 item levels higher than the loop you’re on for full “farm mode.” This combo is what makes it possible. I’m literally typing this as I’m looping without a care in the world.
The key here for this build is grinding through cards. The combo of a lot of tiny creatures paired with the Bookery means you will be getting a lot of cards. Outside of using nine Rocks to build your Mountain Peak, save your Deserts, Forests, and Rocks as card grinding fodder. And yes, that includes surrounding your Treasuries.
Interspace out your Groves so you can also space out your Blood Groves to cover your loop. Extremely useful for helping you deal with mobs. Blood Grove can also cover your campfire as well, which shockingly WILL help you in the boss fight.
Keep it to two or three extended Towns only (one Village, one Wheat Field on either side of it). You get the same single trophy from a Quest Mob as you do from a Goblin. Oh, and use an Oblivion to get rid of that Bandit Camp. As low of a chance as it is, a great way to break your loop if a Bandit steals one of your equipped pieces of gear.
More minor tricks and tips I’ve picked up along the way:
Beat the sub-bosses (Lich, Priest, Hunter) at least three times. Not only does it unlock new flavor text and Steam achievements, but it can also unlock new level-up ability choices for your character.
The Alchemist Tent is the end game piece where life gets easier. Once you get that, you unlock “Alchemy” in the game, which allows you to grind up useless materials (I’m looking at you, Book of Memories) and turn them into much-needed resources like Astral Orbs or Orbs of Unity. As a Rogue, you’re not going to be grinding old equipment like your Warrior or Necromancer does, which is where most of your metal comes from, so you’ll likely need to use that Hydrogen for Stable Metal.
Do NOT place Ruins within range of your base camp. While your Watchtowers you build at your camp won’t help you fight the boss (thanks), enemy Worms WILL aid the boss.